With 189 member countries, staff from more than 170 countries, and offices in over 130 locations, the World Bank Group is a unique global partnership: five institutions working for sustainable solutions that reduce poverty and build shared prosperity in developing countries.

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The World Bank Group works in every major area of development. We provide a wide array of financial products and technical assistance, and we help countries share and apply innovative knowledge and solutions to the challenges they face.

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Global data and statistics, research and publications, and topics in poverty and development

We face big challenges to help the world’s poorest people and ensure that everyone sees benefits from economic growth. Data and research help us understand these challenges and set priorities, share knowledge of what works, and measure progress.

The Turn Down the Heat reports, prepared for the Word Bank by the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and Climate Analytics, provide snapshots of the latest climate science. The three reports warn that without concerted action, temperatures are on pace to rise to 4°C above pre-industrial times by the end of this century. The first report (2012), looks at the risks of a world 4°C or even 2°C warmer. The second (2013) examines the impact on Africa, South Asia, and South East Asia. The third (2014), finds that about 1.5°C warming is already locked in and explores the impact on Latin America and the Caribbean, the Middle East and North Africa, and Eastern Europe and Central Asia.

Report No. 3, November 2014Turn Down the Heat: Confronting the New Climate Normal

The third report in the Turn Down the Heat series finds that warming of about 1.5°C above pre-industrial times is already locked into the Earth’s atmospheric system by past and predicted greenhouse gas emissions, meaning more severe droughts, sea level rise, and increasing risk to food and water security, coastal communities, and livelihoods. Without concerted action, the planet will continue to warm and extreme weather events that today occur once in hundreds of years could become the new climate normal, causing increased risks and instability.

The report, commissioned by the World Bank Group from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and Climate Analytics, analyses likely impacts of 2°C and 4°C warming in three regions — Latin-America and the Caribbean, the Middle East and North Africa, and parts of Europe and Central Asia — and finds feedback loops from melting permafrost and forest dieback and increasingly severe consequences for humans as extreme heat becomes more frequent, water resources become less reliable, diseases move into new ranges, and sea levels rise.

Report No. 2, June 2013Turn Down the Heat: Climate Extremes, Regional Impacts, and the Case for Resilience

The second report in the Turn Down the Heat series examines the likely impacts on three regions if the world warms by 2°C over pre-industrial times by mid-century and continues to become 4°C warmer by 2100 — the expected trajectory if countries don't take action to lower greenhouse gas emissions.

The report looks across Sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia, and South East Asia, revealing how rising global temperatures are increasingly threatening the health and livelihoods of their most vulnerable populations. It describes the risks to agriculture and food security in Sub-Saharan Africa; rise in sea-level and devastation of coastal areas in South East Asia; and fluctuating rain patterns and food production impacts in South Asia.

Report No. 1, November 2012Turn Down the Heat: Why a 4°C Warmer World Must be Avoided

The first report in the Turn Down the Heat series warns that the world is on track to warm by 4°C above pre-industrial times by the end of the century if the global community fails to act on climate change. All regions of the world would suffer – some more than others – but the report finds that the poor will suffer the most.

The authors find that a world 4°C warmer could be devastating, with coastal cities inundated; food security at risk, leading to higher rates of malnutrition; unprecedented heat waves in many regions, especially in the tropics; substantially exacerbated water scarcity in many regions; more intense tropical cyclones; and irreversible loss of biodiversity, including coral reef systems.

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